


dream catcher

by johnsolyuta



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Doctor!Johnny, Explosions, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Serious Injuries, Side Dojae, Side Taeten
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 02:31:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8559919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/johnsolyuta/pseuds/johnsolyuta
Summary: in johnny's story, he knew chittaphon was his soulmate. in chittaphon's story, johnny was just the doctor that tried to save him.





	

_Is it normal to have the same person in your dreams?_ Johnny googled one day after he’d had yet another dream involving a man who he’d never seen in his life before. He just wanted to enjoy his break in between shifts to nap and re-energize but he was left confused and conflicted for the eighth time in two weeks. It was always the same man, his face was so clear to Johnny and he felt a sense of familiarity and comfort while looking at the guy but how could Johnny didn't know who the fuck he was.

Johnny scrolled through article after article, nothing giving him the answers he wanted [or more like the answers he needed]. A particular sentence caught his attention and although it didn’t really pertain to him, it got him thinking.

 _"Perhaps this person you keep seeing will have a part to play in your future?_ ”

Johnny knew for a fact he didn’t have the ability to see into the future, how can he dream about someone whose name he didn’t even know? Johnny saw dozens and dozens of people everyday and their names often slip his mind but he’d never forget a face [especially as beautiful as the man in his dreams].

“Dr. Seo, are you getting up?” Dr. Kim Dongyoung had popped his head through the door to ask. Dr. Kim knew Johnny didn’t have much energy when the days were busier and he took on extra hours - he was kind enough to check in on Johnny every once in awhile to make sure he was doing everything he needed to do so he didn’t lose his job [including getting up after his power naps]. Johnny respected Dongyoung immensely for it, even outside of the work space. Dongyoung had become a great friend of Johnny’s.

Johnny lazily threw on his white coat, fixed his bed head in the mirror, and headed out to do his rounds. He checked in on the stubborn old lady who constantly refused treatment even after she had a stroke, he checked in on the teenager who had dislocated his shoulder and broke a leg trying to perfect some skateboard trick he’d seen in a YouTube video, he checked in on the friendly old man who just had a heart transplant surgery [he was recovering really well, he’d probably be able to go home in a few days], and the lady with dementia who tried to hit on Johnny every time he went into her room because she thought he was her husband. Dr. Seo’s favorite patient however, was a middle aged man who snuck his dog into the hospital because he didn’t want Sugar (his miniature poodle) to be lonely at home while he was getting treatment. Johnny only found out that Sugar was in the hospital when he went to do rounds and caught the old man feeding the dog. It was quite a funny, heartwarming sight but Johnny had rules to follow as a doctor, so he was forced to tell the man the dog had to go back home.

“Dr. Seo!” Johnny heard from down the hallway as he made his way from patient to patient. Johnny turned around to see one of the nurses flagging him down.

“Yes?” Johnny placed his hands in his jacket pockets, as he had become overly conscious of his body language while talking to others after Dongyoung had told him he gave off a very intimidating vibe [the fact he was also considered one of the best doctors in the hospital added to it].

“The police are here to talk to you about the car accident victim that came in yesterday.” She informed him. He nodded, thanking her for letting him know as he headed toward the patient's room where the doctors would be waiting. He read off her chart to the police, informing them of everything he knew about her current state, then the police thanked him for his time and left.

He finished his rounds and helped new patients as they came in. The next time he got a break was when he was able to leave to go home. Johnny lived alone and when he was there, all he did was sleep. Some nights he didn’t even go home when the ER was busy, he just slept at the hospital to save time. He didn’t have anyone to come to, he didn’t have any time to meet new people when he was studying medicine or doing internships. He’d came to terms with putting his all into his work. This is what he wanted his whole life and he’s finally achieved it. On his way home that day, he stopped to feed Sugar and make sure she was well [at his patients pleading request]. It was a good day.

* * *

 " _Let’s get married.” Johnny found himself saying to the other. He drew circles with his finger into the other’s back as they laid in bed together, bare legs sticking to each other as their limbs were all tangled up._

_The other lifted his head off Johnny’s chest and stared at Johnny, unsure if he was being serious or not. “It’s only been nine months.”_

_“Oh.” Was all Johnny was able to get out. He was well aware of the fact that they hadn’t been together for long but Johnny thought it didn’t matter to him. The two laid there silently, still holding each other in their arms._

_“These nine months… these nine months have been the happiest months of my life.” He whispered as he rested his head back on Johnny’s chest, wrapping his arms just a little tighter around Johnny’s waist. “Love just seems like a myth, you know? I never thought I’d be able to fall so deeply in love with a person. It hit me like a train a few months into our relationship that I didn’t want this to be a fling - I didn’t want what we had to die out. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you and bring you to holiday dinners at my parents house, to wake up to you every morning like this, to make love to you, to be there for you when you’re at your lowest, and most of all, to be able to call you mine without the fear that one day you won’t be.”_

_“We can wait if you want?” Johnny swallowed nervously, slightly confused by the other’s speech and what they meant by it. All Johnny got from it was that he loved him._

_“I don’t want to wait, though.” He shook his head. “It’s only been nine months, people might think we’re crazy and you know what? Let them think whatever they want. I’ve never been so sure about anything in my life but I know for a fact that I want to marry you.”_

* * *

Out of all the dreams Johnny had, this was the one that confused him the most. He knew the dreams had some kind of relationship tone to them, he realized that when the fourth dream he had involved the other nervously asking Johnny to be his boyfriend. It’s almost as if all the dreams are in some kind of chronological order. First, Johnny dreams of meeting the other when he got a job at some newspaper factory. That escalated into them going on a date, and then another, and then the fourth dream where it all hit Johnny. The man kept haunting him, he couldn’t shake him out of his thoughts even after he stopped dreaming.

Johnny just wanted to know what it all meant.

"Johnny?" Dr. Kim said to him as they stood looking over some papers. Since they were friends, Johnny allowed him to use a first name basis but only on things that didn't involve work.

"Yeah?" He flipped the page of one of the packets, taking mental notes on the patients prior health issues for future reference.

"Are you seeing someone?" Dongyoung asked out of the blue. It nearly made Johnny choke on the piece of gum he had from how hard he was laughing.

"Me? Dating someone?" He continued laughing at it for another minute before his laughter finally died down. It wasn't even that funny of a question, it just came as a shock to Johnny and he didn't know how else to react. "You know I'm basically married to my job."

"It's just that you seem really sidetracked lately." He muffled his words so the other nurses and doctors around couldn't hear. "If you're seeing someone you can just tell me. Your secrets are safe with me."

Johnny cracked a smile. "I promise I'm not seeing anyone. I just... haven't been sleeping well lately."

After a few seconds, Dongyoung tried to lighten the atmosphere. "Lets go out for drinks tonight as friends, not colleagues - it's been months since we last did that."

"If I get done with everything by then."

"Code Triage! Code Triage!" A nurse came running down the hall, through a door and then back into the ER helping the EMT's roll in a patient, followed by another, and then another. Dr. Seo and Dr. Kim quickly dropped what they were doing to help the mass of patients that had just been wheeled in. The ER had quickly turned into chaos. Patients screamed in pain, people ran frantically around trying to get the supplies they needed to help the burn victims - pretty soon when family members heard the news and came to the hospital, it'd be a whole new kind of chaos.

Johnny overheard one of the EMT's telling a nurse that there had been an explosion at a factory. Many had died at the scene but the ones that were still alive were brought in. Johnny cut open the half burnt shirt the man was wearing to see how extreme his burns were so he could begin treatment as soon as possible. Once the shirt was off, Johnny could see bruising on the mans right rib - that meant he had some kind of bleeding, broken ribs, or even a collapsed lung. Just as he was about to feel the area to see what the source of damage was, the man started choking and having trouble breathing. "Get his mask off! We need to give him oxygen!" Dr. Seo ordered. He quickly grabbed an oxygen mask and as soon as the mask was off, Dr. Seo was giving him oxygen. As he pumped air into the mans lungs to keep him alive, Johnny was frozen in place as he started at the man beneath him. The man looked around the room for a few seconds, obviously not fully aware of whats just happened. His eyes met Johnny's and that's when it hit him. It was him. It was the man from his dreams, right here in front of him, injured and barely holding onto life.

"Dr. Seo!" Nurse Hansol repeatedly tried to get his attention but Johnny couldn't find it in him to move. When Nurse Hansol took over and started pumping the oxygen into the man was when Johnny finally snapped back to reality. Before he knew it, the man he dreamed of marrying last night was being wheeled into emergency surgery for a collapsed lung. Johnny wanted to follow, to make sure that man was going to be okay, but he was pulled in the opposite direction to help a woman who was missing a leg. They were able to cut off the bleeding before she too was wheeled into surgery. More and more victims came in from the explosion as they were found. Johnny did his duty to help the people who needed him but as soon as he seized an opportunity to go check on the man, he took it.

He hurried toward the OR, discarding his bloody gloves in a trash can along the way. The surgeon exited the operating room and was a little surprised to see Dr. Seo standing there. "Was he your patient?"

"Was?"

"He didn't make it through surgery. Along with his collapsed lung, he had significant internal bleeding and brain damage from the explosion. We tried everything we possibly could." The surgeon explained too monotone for Johnny's liking. "Dr. Seo, did you know him?"

Johnny shook his head. "No, I did not." It was the truth but for some reason Johnny's voice cracked. The surgeon walked right past him, probably going to another surgery or whatever else the man had planned for today. Johnny knew if he looked through the window that he'd see him lying on the operating table - so Johnny turned and walked the other way.

* * *

 " _We should tell our parents about the wedding." The other said as they ate dinner._

_"They'll disapprove and force us to end things. You know this already." Johnny replied hastily. The thought of their parents reaction made Johnny's stomach turn with nausea._

_"I don't care what they say." The man that was so familiar to Johnny yet still so unknown took a deep breath before speaking again. "If they choose to cut ties with me, so be it. Marrying you is..."_

_"They're your family, though! You can't just choose me over them."_

_"I love you! I want to be with you! I want to be able to call you my family!" He exclaimed all in one breath. "If we tell them, we don't have to keep it a secret anymore. I'm tired of having to call you my work friend when I bring you around my family. Aren't you tired of it too?"_

_Johnny was really tired of it. Johnny was tired of saying they were something they weren't. They weren't work friends, Johnny wasn't letting him sleep over because his roommate was a dick... They were boyfriends - recently engaged boyfriends - who lived with each other. Johnny didn't have to give a response for the other to know how he was feeling._

_"Lets tell them on Sunday." He suggested and Johnny didn't like the idea one bit but if it made his fiancé happy, Johnny would do it despite what might happen. For him._

* * *

Johnny stayed the night at the hospital again that night. The patients who were still holding onto life required constant attention. The families of the victims had been alerted and many came in to either be by their sides or to identify their loved ones body. While it was hectic all throughout the hospital, Johnny found some peace and quiet in the bunks.

It was weird, you know? Johnny kept having dreams with this man but he'd never met him before today. Does today even count as meeting him? The most interaction they had was eye contact. He didn't even know his name yet he'd gone on dates with him, made love to him, got engaged to him... The dreams were too real to just be something his mind made up. _What did they mean?_

A list came into the hospital of all the missing workers. Their job was to identify all the ones they had that were alive and the ones that weren't. Johnny skimmed the list during one of his breaks but none of the names rung a bell. He knew he shouldn't do it but if he didn't, he would never get the answers he wanted. The answers he needed.

The lower level of the hospital was cold. Johnny didn't come down here often but the dusty, sour smell was engraved in his brain. He procrastinated going in and would've stalled going in for another ten minutes or so but the coroner walked out of the room, startling Johnny in which startled the coroner in return. "Doctor, may I help you?"

He stuttered for a second as he gathered what he wanted to say. "I want to know if one of my patients from the explosion had been identified yet." The coroner seemed a little thrown off - it's not often a doctor came asking about a dead patient.

The coroner agreed none the less, inviting Dr. Seo into his room. "Some have been harder to identify due to the degree of burns on the body." The older woman babbled off what she knew, searching around her cluttered desk for the papers she needed.

"Do you have information on identifying the body or are you just here for a name?" She asked.

"A name, please."

"Well, sadly, I have a lot of bodies in my morgue right now so you'll have to be a little more specific."

"He died in surgery. I was told he had a collapsed lung, internal bleeding, and brain damage." Dr. Seo listed off.

"You were told? I thought he was your patient."

"He _was_ my patient but then five minutes after he came in he was wheeled off into surgery."

The coroner nodded, seeming to understand the situation more clearly now. "If it helps, his face didn't have any burns on it. It was protected by some kind of mask they used at the factories."

The added information sparked something in the coroner's mind because suddenly she was walking over to the cold chambers and pulling a drawer open. The only thing Johnny could see under the blue cloth was two feet with visible burns that disappeared under the blanket. The coroner read the tag off - " _Chittaphon Leechaiyapornkul_ ".

Johnny finally had a name for the man that plagued his thoughts for the past two weeks. Johnny finally had a name but in the end it didn't matter because the man was dead. "His husband identified him this morning."

"His husband?" Johnny questioned, trying to make it sound the least nosy as possible.

"Lee Taeyong is the husband's name. He told me they'd been married just shy of a year and that he was really the only family Chittaphon had." The coroner explained, her hands pausing over the blanket. "Did you want to see him?"

Johnny quickly refused, claiming he had to get back to his duties.

The following days, Johnny slept little and worked more. When he did sleep, he slept too light or was too deep into the sleep that he didn't dream at all. Maybe that was for the best. He was silently mourning over someone he hadn't actually met - how could that even be? The man couldn't be the same man he dreamed about. There was no logical way. The dreams felt like memories but how can someone have memories with someone they'd never met?

Over a few weeks time, things calmed down. Patients stabilized, they showed signs they'd make it and be able to live a life even with burns that covered much of their body; things were looking better for everyone.

Johnny didn't expect the dreams with Chittaphon to abruptly stop. They were planning their wedding; that was the last dream Johnny had of Chittaphon. It's been two weeks since Johnny last had a dream about him. Johnny felt confused, so he sought answers.

"You were dreaming of someone you'd never met before? And you were in a relationship with them?" The counselor tried to sum up what Johnny had just explained to him [although he left out the factory accident part].

Johnny nodded. "Yes."

"I'm not really one to say things that aren't backed up by scientific evidence but - do you believe in reincarnation?" The counselor threw at Johnny.

"Reincarnation?" Johnny asked dumbfounded.

"Yeah, like when you die then -"

"I know what reincarnation is but what does that have to do with my situation?"

"This is way out of what my degree taught me but what I'm trying to say is... the dreams you may be having could possibly be memories from a past life."

Johnny sat across from the counselor trying to understand the information he was being told. "Maybe you're having these dreams because you're destined to cross paths again - you know, in this life?"

Johnny's throat felt dry at his words, nodding in response. "Yeah, we did cross paths."

"Really?" The counselor chirped. "Before or after your dreams stopped?"

"I've had two dreams about him after we met but then they stopped."

"How did you meet? Are you sure it was real life and not just another dream?"

 _Oh, how Johnny wished it was a dream_. "He came into the hospital when the factory exploded. I'm a doctor, I was helping him."

The counselor was unsure of how to respond to this information.

"He died that day." Johnny quietly added.

The counselors voice was light, a tone of guilt evident as he responded. "You should find a professional who knows more about this kind of thing - I'm sorry for wasting your time." Johnny left the counseling center without another word.

Memories from a past life? How cliche is that?

 _Does that make us soulmates or something?_ Johnny jokingly thought to himself, trying to make a joke out of the whole reincarnation thing. Soulmates weren't real. They were just something book writers made up to make love seem cooler in their sappy romance novels.

Johnny made himself believe they weren't anything more than just dreams. It made him feel better about all of it. If Johnny believed in anything, it was coincidences. Perhaps, Johnny's brain just imagined a beautiful face to go with his subconscious desire to have a significant other and the man in his dreams just so happened to look like the guy he aided in the hospital that day. Coincidences happen all the time.

"Dr. Seo?" A little girl asked one day as Johnny was examining her fractured wrist.

"Yes?" He continued to examine her hand and wrist, occasionally pressing on the bruising area  or rotating her hand in the slightest to see what hurt and what didn't.

"Are you married?" She asked. Her parents immediately scolded her for being so straightforward with a complete stranger but Dr. Seo simply smiled at her question.

"No, I am not."

"Do you want to be married?" She quickly followed with.

"I don't have time to be married. My job keeps me very busy." Dr. Seo kept the conversation with the young girl going despite her interrogating questions because if she wasn't thinking about her fractured wrist, she wasn't thinking as much about the pain and therefore, not crying.

"Have you ever been in love?"

"I'm sorry, Dr. Seo. She's been obsessed with the whole love thing lately." The mom sincerely apologized, in which Johnny responded with how he didn't mind it.

"Well, have you?" She persisted.

"Not yet. Maybe I have been in a past life, though." Johnny didn't even realize what he was saying until it came out. He hadn't thought about Chittaphon - or more like the idea of Chittaphon in a while.

"A past life? Do you believe in soulmates too, Dr. Seo?" The little girl chirped in excitement. Dr. Seo quickly changed the subject, standing up and turning toward the parents.

"It does seem like she has a pretty significant fracture but we won't know for sure until we get a x-ray done." And with that, Johnny was off to get the x-ray set up for her.

The term soulmates had came up again and this time it wasn't himself thinking it. If [in the slightest chance] Chittaphon had been his soulmate and those dreams Johnny had been having really were memories, why did he just suddenly start having them? If Chittaphon was his soulmate, how come he died when they finally crossed paths? How come Chittaphon was already married to someone else? Johnny had so many questions and no way of getting answers.

Was Johnny really letting himself get dragged back into his never ending thoughts about this because of what some little girl said?

When he got the free chance, he turned to Dongyoung to help him sort his feelings out. "Do you believe in soulmates?"

"I don't know - I haven't really thought about it. Why do you ask?" Dongyoung mindlessly responded as he changed out of his scrubs and into his casual clothes.

"Do you think Yoonoh could be your soulmate?"

Dongyoung laughed aloud at Johnny's question. " I wouldn't say that I found my soulmate when I've been in the same city for my whole life. There's so many people in the world I haven't met so calling him the love of my life seems more acceptable."

"What if you started having dreams of a random person that turned out to be your soulmate? Would you go on a hunt to find them?"

"Dreams?" Dongyoung questioned. He hadn't been taking the conversation very seriously until he finally glanced at Johnny and realized that this wasn't just a friendly lighthearted conversation. "I don't know what I'd do - I guess if I was meant to be with my soulmate in my lifetime, we'd cross paths one way or another."

Johnny hummed at his words, thinking deeply. Chittaphon and Johnny had cross paths and fallen in love in another life. This life however, they crossed paths and didn't fall in love. Did this mean they weren't actually soulmates? Or did life have other plans? "Is this what's been bothering you lately?" Dongyoung questioned as he sat on the bench next to Johnny so he would put on his shoes.

"Yeah, kind of..." Johnny trailed off. He'd only told one person about this before and it was a complete stranger - someone whom he didn't care what they thought of him. Dongyoung was Johnny's coworker and more importantly his friend. What if Dongyoung didn't take him seriously? What if he laughed at him because of it? You know - being all wrapped up in someone he's never met before?

"I take it that the reason you haven't been sleeping much lately is because you've been having dreams about your... soulmate?" Dongyoung put the information together in his head. Johnny nodded. "So, what's been bothering you about it? Do you need advice on if you should go and find them or if you should wait until you cross paths?"

"It's not like that - we've crossed paths already. He was a patient here a few weeks ago." Johnny avoided eye contact with the other.

"And what happened?"

"He had a collapsed lung and significant internal damage from the explosion. He didn't even make it out of surgery." Johnny didn't realize he started crying until Dongyoung pulled him in for a hug.

"If he's your soulmate, you'll meet again in another life."

"Out of every possible way I could've met him - it had to be that way, you know? It's like God wanted me to be unhappy."

"God isn't out to get you; you're a good man. Sometimes life just isn't fair." Dongyoung reassuringly rubbed Johnny's back. "Live this life to the fullest so you can have no regrets in the next. Don't be afraid to love someone just because you know they're not your soulmate. Don't hold yourself back because of this. _There's always going to be another life_."

As cheesy as Dongyoung's words were, he was right. He was so right. Dongyoung's comfort and friendly advice was what Johnny really needed this whole time. Of course, Johnny wouldn't be able to get over Chittaphon right away - that'll take time but time heals. He knows now that if it was ever bothering him, he could find comfort in Dongyoung.

Chittaphon was Johnny's soulmate after all - this end was just a new beginning.


End file.
